There's a New Twitter for BlackBerry, But Does it Matter?

Parent company Research In Motion[1] (RIM) may be hemorrhaging cash and fighting rumors of impending doom[2], but BlackBerry’s remaining users can still enjoy a new version of Twitter on their smartphones.

Twitter for BlackBerry [3]version 3.1 adds more detail and context to tweets, according to a corporate blog post that announced the update[4] on Monday. Users can now see full-resolution photos from pic.twitter.com and RIM maps for geotagged tweets, writes product manager Brian Frank. The “details view” familiar to most mobile users also makes it easier to view tweets’ replies and the conversations they fit into. And Twitter for Blackberry now supports right-to-left languages including Hebrew and Arabic.

With a new details view and the ability to undo a retweet by simply tapping the retweet button again, BlackBerry users on Twitter[5] can now enjoy features that other mobile tweeters have had for some time. The relatively late additions could easily be interpreted as another sign of BlackBerry’s diminished importance and declining status in the smartphone landscape.

RIM revealed last month that BlackBerry sales had dropped a colossal 43%[2] on the previous quarter, and the company is expected to cut thousands of jobs in an effort to curtail costs. Then last week, RIM lost over $147 million[6] in a California patent dispute verdict — and that blow came after the company reportedly put one of its two corporate jets up for sale online[7].

Despite the ominous signs, though, BlackBerry still has millions of users who could use an update from Twitter. A Twitter spokesperson declined to break down its mobile user base by platform, but did say nearly 60% of the service’s 140 million active users frequently access Twitter from mobile[8] devices.